Winston Commits to Arkansas, Blogger Rants on Recruiting Hype

Darius Winston, the most recent in a long string of recruiting cock teases (see: Kieland Williams, Joe McKnight, Frank Gore, et al), committed to the Arkansas Razorbacks today at noon.

Who else isn't surprised by this?

When I tell people that I quit giving a hell about recrootin' and they subsequently ask me why, I just point to these incidents. Honestly, they all follow a pretty straight-up forumla:

• 5 star, 4 star, or highly touted 3 star athlete
• Not from Mississippi
• Mentions the Rebels often but never in a glaringly positive light, until...
• They rant and rave about the Grove, IPF, etc
• "I really love/have a great relationship with/just got $100 from coach [coach's surname]"
• Yancy Porter and the like swear up and down the kid's a Rebel before saying "oh, well maybe" a day before he commits elsewhere

If you still get your hopes up over these kids or, even worse, hold it against them (as if you somehow know them) personally then you're persistently delusional and likely stupid. I can remember the Rivals board after Drew Allen committed to Oklahoma. I was dumbfounded. People were attacking the kid for committing to Oklahoma (one of college footballs best programs, ever) after talking highly of Oxford, Kent Austin, et al. Ok, so he likes the town and the coach, that's cool, whatever, but he's from San Antonio. We don't recruit San Antonio. We hardly recruit Texas. Yet somehow people acted as if this Allen character had placed a voodoo curse on our houses.

Everybody, tone down the recruiting babble for now. So we didn't get Winston. I personally thought we never had a shot in the first place but, remember, these are 17-and-18-year-olds who have no real clue as to what they're doing and oftentimes change their minds anyway. They're not deliberately stringing anybody along. Hell, they're confused, if anything! They've got a bunch of old white guys calling them constantly and even coming to their houses to promise them cars, money, sex, and glory an opportunity to earn a wonderful education while successfully playing a sport which they enjoy! So they may say some misleading stuff and like the things being promised to them by a myriad of different schools. Why is this such a problem?

Ok, sorry for getting carried away there. I needed to vent that out.